Beth's Blog: Nonprofits and Social Media

Meeting @hardlynormal: Homeless Activist on Twitter

Photo with Mark Horvath, @hardlynormal

We did three things while we were in Santa Monica - visited the Getty, road the Ferris Wheel on the Pier, and had coffee with Mark Horvath, an advocate for homeless who uses social media to tell their stories and much more.  I first heard about Mark when he spoke at Gnomedex this year and our paths crossed virtually on the Twitter activist list, and was finally delighted to meet him in person.

Mark will lead a SXSW session "A Conversation About Social Change Through Social Media", sharing how he was able to utilize such social networking tools as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube in bringing attention and action to the issue of homelessness in America.

Mark was recently named "Person of the Year" over at the Being the Difference blog and captures his inspiring accomplishments.

One of the highlights of our trip! 

Generation Generosity

Goodness And Happiness - Why Generosity Is The Future Of Marketing Strategy

View more presentations from neilperkin. (tags: digital planning)

Trendwatching has released its February report called "Generation Generosity" They sum it up as:

"Giving is the new taking, and sharing is the new giving.n fact, for many, sharing a passion and receiving recognition have replaced 'taking' as the new status symbol. Businesses should follow this societal/behavioral shift, however much it may oppose their decades-old devotion to me, myself and I.”

It covers a number of drivers of this trend, but what is most interesting to me is the "individuals" angle:

However, in essence, GENERATION G isn't about anger and recessions: the larger and more lasting trend is passionate, empowered individuals (if not entire generations) being more willing and able to give, to share, to collaborate; to be more ‘generous’ in many ways. Which in turn has made generosity one of a new set of status symbols.

The most important driver behind GENERATION G is a wide variety of consumers and citizens being more generous. We're talking the collaborative / free / creation / crowdsourced / gift / sharing movement* that—especially online—has unlocked in entirely new ways the perennial need of individuals to be appreciated, to be loved, to feel part of the greater good, to contribute, to help... To basically find status and gratification in something other than consuming the most or the best.

Don't think this a passing phenomenon: younger generations practically live online, while over the last dozen or so years, virtually every prediction of how the web would infiltrate the 'offline' world has proven too conservative. As our favorite online guru, Kevin Kelly, rightly stated a few years ago: ‘online culture is the culture’.

So... Everything seems to have aligned to make generosity (“liberality in giving or willingness to give”) a leading theme in the business arena this year. As always, companies can learn from consumers, though it's not a 'want' but a 'need': companies need to mirror this societal shift if they want to regain their relevancy. We’re talking truly becoming a caring brand—one that is generous to customers, generous to employees, generous to the environment, generous to social causes, and so on. We know you know this: GENERATION G is more about context and timing than out-of-the-blue insights.

The report goes on to offer eight broad tips about how corporations can be kinder and more generous to their customers.

1. CO-DONATE
2. ECO-GENEROSITY
3. FREE LOVE
4. BRAND BUTLERS
5. PERKONOMICS
6. TRYVERTISING
7. RANDOM ACTS OF KINDNESS (RAK)
8. (F)RIGID NO MORE

What does generation generosity mean for your nonprofit?

More from Neil Perkin

Twestival: Are Fundraising Groundswells A Massive Opportunity or Distraction for Nonprofit Organizations?

I've been experimenting with online fundraising in an age of social media since 2006.  It is evolving from individuals leveraging their personal networks to groundswells.  

Last week, I wrote about Twestival, the most recent example of fundraising on Twitter and a networked fundraiser of a scale we haven't seen before.  I titled the post "Look Out Here Comes Everybody To Raise Money for charity:water on Twitter" with a wink to Clay Shirky's work.  In the comments, there was quite a lively discussion from nonprofit professionals raising some cautions and concerns. 

This made me curious:

• How did Twestival get started?  What is its relationship with charity:water?
• What was the role of the nonprofit, charity:water, in working with Twestival?
• How did the relationship originate?
• How is the event being organized?
• What does this say for nonprofits in an age of connectedness?

First, let me recap what Twestival is.

On February 12, 2009,  Twitter users will meet up in over 100 plus cities to socialize offline, meet other Twitter users, enjoy some fun, have a few drinks, and raise money for charity: water.  This event combines the lessons learned from previous fundraising activities on Twitter:

• A local, face-to-face component based on the popular "Tweet Ups" or "Net2Tuesday" meetups
• Decentralized event organizing, it's grassroots and anyone can organize a local event
• The charity isn't the central organizer of the event - it appears that they are letting their stakeholders run with it and not imposing "branding and messaging" standards.  Each localized event is putting its own unique flair to the event.
• Micro donations using TipJoy
• Focus 24 hour event with broadcasts and all local partners participating to raise awareness (a sort of Blog Action Day on steroids)
• They have announced a goal of raising $500,000, based on each city establishing its own goal.

I'm attending the TwestivalSf in San Francisco - anyone else?

In the comments, there was quite a lively discussion from nonprofit professionals raising some cautions and concerns.  I've summarized some of themes below:

Is this a swarm of independent mavericks or a carefully crafted and managed groundswell?

David Kinard, nonprofit marketing consultant, mentioned a big concern about peer-to-peer fundraising: the big picture is lost, and the impact to the greater good is diminished.  He also had concerns about the apparent disjointed effort underway.

I guess I look at it like this: if you give a hundred people tools to lay bricks, you'll likely get a hundred small structures. If you give a hundred people the tools to lay bricks and get them working off a shared plan, then you can build anything you want. I am all for equipping believers of a cause to go out to the world and do good...but I am less enthusiastic of sending out a swarm of independent mavericks.

Allison Fine observed that the big picture goal of efforts like Twestival is to begin to develop larger ecosystems of activists that are connected and coordinated with one another.  She notes, "The focus of leaders in the sector needs to be how to better work within these ecosystems to meet their own missions as well as meet the larger needs of communities."

Marcia Stepanek, who writes the CauseGlobal Blog mentions an interview with Clay Shirky where he describes the importance of new leadership:

What I think is coming is a new type of leadership style that will expand into other kinds of collective action—in particular, real-world collective action. And so, for a traditional institution, this is really a moment where, if the organizational structure doesn't change, then the institution is essentially going to find itself working at cross-purposes with many of its members. This is a challenge that people in the Obama administration are facing; that people in nonprofits are facing; that people in many institutions are facing: how to change the organizational structure enough to accommodate Web-enabled, ground-up, collective action—self-organized groups of members or supporters or constituents that, because they're using new technology tools, are demanding interaction at far higher levels than before. This is something that really is unprecedented. Those organizations which fail to exert new leadership will risk losing support.

This lead me to ask what exactly were those new nonprofit leadership skills?

Marcia suggested that the skills are similar to those of a symphony orchestra conductor.  Shirky adds to this point:

There is an Israeli conductor, Itay Talgam, who gives a talk on leadership styles using orchestra conductors as the example. And the critical thing that a conductor does is synchronize the orchestra because the complexity of self-synchronization is hard at that scale.

As someone who trained as a classical flutist and has played in a symphony orchestra or two, the conductor's role is pivotal for that synchronicity but if the musicians know their parts, the score, and someone gives the downbeat, they could play without the conductor.   Especially if the players in the orchestra have been playing together for years! 

David felt this was less of an issue of learning new leadership skills, but simply a distraction.

What I fear is not that swarms of cause-wired activists will force new forms of leadership, but that the leadership will be distracted from doing the right work in the right order because they have to deal with the unintentioned disruption these good-hearted people likely create. If large communities of independent change-agents force sector leaders to take their eyes off the ball of their primary mission, then I think we've done more damage than good.

Twestival: The origins of the  'Tweet, meet, and give"

I was curious about how the Twestival founders connected with charity:water.  I interviewed Ben Matthews  who was part of the organizational group that dreamed up the Twestival concept in London in September 2008.  The group consisted of  @amanda, @tommalcolm, @renate and @timhoang.  They all work in PR, but Ben is the founder of Brightone, a company that works with charities.  So this is a group of social media power users and pr professionals who have some experience with nonprofits.  And they were not total strangers to one another.  Says Ben, "We knew each other on Twitter."

Says Ben,  "The idea was to run a festival that got people who followed each other on Twitter to meet up in real life, but also come together to raise money for a good cause at the same time."  This small group organized the first Twestival to raise money for The Connection,  an organization that helps homeless people by providing specialist services.  "What's amazing is that the whole thing came together in about 3 weeks and generated lots of interest and around 300 attendees (with a waiting list) in such a short space of time."

Buoyed by the success of their first event,  the Twestival organizers wanted to do a second event, selecting a charity that had a global outreach and an active presence on Twitter.   They were looking for a charity that was transparent and could easily demonstrate the impact of their fundraising efforts.  Kiva, charity:water and a few others were mentioned.  

Scott Harrison, Founder of charity: water - Thanks the Twestival from Phil Thomas Di Giulio on Vimeo.

The Relationship with charity:water

This group of Twitter do gooders in London did not a formal relationship with the charity:water management staff, but charity:water's founder, Scott Harrison, was active on Twitter (@scottharrison).   As Ben observes, "Well that ticked the boxes on the accountability and global presence fronts. Whatever amount that Twestival raises, every pound, dollar, pesos, krone and whatever else will go straight to charity:water and that money will be used to directly fund charity:water projects."

When the Twestival founders approached charity:water, they listened to the organization's concerns.  The nonprofit wanted to make sure that the money raised got to charity:water.   The Twestival partnered with amiando and tipjoy to ensure that the money goes into a central source and can be easily tracked.  (See Rachel Weidinger's thoughts about the importance of a donation system respecting donor privacy, though.)

Ben also mentions that the charity:water's other concern is that the event must be a success for charity:water's own reputation.  "Their 2008 Christmas ball raised a very large amount of money, so we have a lot to live up to, but are confident that the Twestival events happening in over 160 cities worldwide on February 12th 2009, it will be a great success!"

Also bear in mind that charity:water had been aware of the event plans long before any formal announcements were made.  They have had control in whether to let, Twestival, raise money for their work. As Ben notes, "If they did feel that we were going to disrupt them from focusing on their core mission, then they could simply say have said no.  We would have identified a different charity."

It is also important to point out as Scott Harrison mentions in the video above, that Twitter power users and indeed the founders of Twitter have been supportive of the charity:water over the past year.  This large scale event is the not the first.  There were other smaller events to support charity:water on Twitter prior to the September event organized by Twestival.

The Swarm Is Organized, Not Random

The Twestival has been a grassroots effort lead by Amanda, a professional events organizer.  According to Ben, she had the vision to take Twestival worldwide and has taken on responsibility of organizing the global aspect. With over 160 cities participating, Ben observes, "It's a momentous task with an amazing amount of time an energy required to bring it all together, but she's really achieved so much already, which will hopefully lead to lots of money being raised on the night."

While Twestival is an all-volunteer effort organized outside of the nonprofit direct management and control, the volunteers are highly organized. There are guidelines of how the city organizers can run their own event.  It is not a template.   Ben says, "We didn't want to dictate what they did, as it didn't matter how big or small it was or how much money they raised. By allowing people to design their own events but under the original ethos of Twestival of raising money for a selected charity, the event becomes more self-organising. Having said that, I'm sure Amanda's email inbox is the busiest in the world right now!"

Tony Scott (@tonys), a technology volunteer, has also been instrumental in the effort. He's put together the main Twestival site that helped the cities to manage their own events.Says Ben, "It's through here that all the details, ticketing, sponsors and other info for all of the individual events are gathered. The dev blog is a testament to his work." 

Conclusion

The Twestival just announced a goal of $500,000.  So, on February 13th, we'll be able to see where this all goes and how networked fundraising evolves and what the implications are for nonprofit social media strategies and leadership. 

Questions to ponder ....

• charity:water has a presence on Twitter and has the caught the attention of social media gurus like Twitter's founders and Mashable.   Can nonprofits who have relationships with social media rockstars create a groundswell of support?
• Many nonprofits perceive "personal networking" on social networking sites like Twitter to be a waste of time.  If this campaign reaches its financial goal and is a success for the organization, there certainly should demonstrate a ROI for personal networking and building relationships?
• What are the best ways to cultivate relationships with free agent fundraisers and collaborate on fundraisers with them?   Seems like facilitative leadership is key.
• Could there be other groundswells of disjointed activists who don't connect with the charity - but take on the fundraising or even the program delivery that does not further the greater good?

Resources

Mashable, Twestival Social Media for Social Change
Other links aggregated on my original post, "Look Out, Here Comes Everybody To Raise Money for charity:water on Twitter"

Posts about earlier charity:water and Twitter efforts
Paul Young's Reflection on his September Birthday Campaign
Pistachio's experiment in micro fundraising
September Birthdays on charity:water

Birthday Campaign Reflection: Will Your Nonprofit Embrace Free Agent Fundraisers?

Photo emailed from Cambodia by Elephant, Sharing Foundation's in-country director

In this post, I share some learnings as a free agent fundraiser (an individual who uses personal fundraising to raise money for a charity) who is leveraging their personal network to support a nonprofit's programs that help children in need.  I've also summarized the story of a how one social media guru, David Armano, leveraged his large network to help a family a need and has stepped into the role of donor steward and even service delivery.  

I'm An Embedded Free Agent Fundraiser

My most recent social media fundraising experiment was a birthday campaign that raised $6225 from 161 donors using Facebook Causes Birthday application to benefit the non profit organization, The Sharing Foundation.  This was my 7th campaign since November, 2006, bringing the grand total raised for Cambodian kids to approximately $215,000 using social media tools.

While I am a long-time volunteer and board member for the Sharing Foundation,  my experiments have been from the point of view of a "free agent fundraiser," that is an individual who leverages their network using social media tools to raise money for a cause or charity.  I have not been met with resistance from other leaders inside the organization, so I'm operating as an embedded free agent.    

Strategy Learnings

I am convinced that incorporating social media successfully into a nonprofit marketing and fundraising plan requires a rapid listen, learn, and adapt sequence.   This is reiterative learning.  It's not easy to do because it requires balancing action with reflection.   On an organizational level, incorporating this approach may be easy or hard depending your organization's culture.

How do nonprofits incorporate iterative learning about their social media strategies within the organization?

• Make It Personal:  I've said this before and so has Katya Andresen.  "The messenger is more important than the Cause."   All of my messaging speaks to why I'm passionate about helping children in Cambodia and why it is  important to my family.  I tweeted about how my family was involved, how my kids dipped into their piggy banks and how other family members were contributing.   Also, when people contributed, I sent them a tweet with a link that shared why the Cause is so important.  

• Conversational Fundraising, Not Asking: Twitter is great for "viral spreading of your message" and is useful for donor acquisition.  But I really wonder in the long term if that is an effective strategy.  I think Katya Andresen's "Preach to the Choir and Get Them Singing Your Tune Outside of Church" is so right on.   Are you focused on using social media to build deeper relationships and repeat donors over time or is your strategy simply viral spreading?   In this campaign, I did less direct asking for money or retweeting on Twitter and focused on engaging followers in conversations about the campaign.   The reason is because this was a more intimate campaign and The Facebook Birthday Cause focuses on your friends, who you have a relationship with.

• Show how a small amount can it make a big difference:   Now here's where  Facebook Birthday Causes application gets in the way of good fundraising practice.  It forces you to ask for donations in the amount of your age or in my case $52.    So, I messaged around that letting folks know that a donation of $10 will make a huge difference because it will cover the cost of a school uniform and allow a Cambodian youngster attend school.   When I gave progress reports, I let people know how many kids would be able to go to school because of the total donated.   I hope Facebook Causes makes the ask a little bit more flexible.

• Keep It Multi-Channel, But Within Your Capacity To Implement:  I have 1,500 friends on Facebook, although it pales in comparison to some super connected social media gurus like Chris Brogan and Robert Scoble.  When I first sent word out about my birthday campaign to my Facebook friends, I started to hear back about how they would like to donate, but not through Causes.  For example, some of new Romanian friends wanted to contribute, but couldn't because Romania wasn't on the list of accepted credit cards.  I already anticipated this would happen based on my experience with my 5th campaign, so I had a Network For Good badge set up and waiting to go if people asked.  They did and I was ready.  

I had also set up a TipJoy with an eye towards a micro donation Twitter component,  but my capacity was maxed out.  I was concerned about directing people to too many different places to donate might cause confusion.  I want to explore this at some point in the future, so for now I'm watching what Laura Fitton is doing with her Charity Water Micro Donations Campaign.

• Keep It Happy, Keep It Fun, Keep A Deadline, Keep It Urgent:     I try as much as possible to have fun with these campaigns.  I think it works.  For example, I started Tweeting about that I was writing a post about happy people on Twitter and people were curious about it.   The post was a fun fundraising appeal, "I Feel Good Now That I've Donated"   I also had a deadline thanks to the Birthday Causes application and the match I set up.  We had to make that match by my birthday.  I tweeted that I would donate 10 x my age if we made the match, and this message was retweeted.  

• Saying Thank You In Personal Ways:   This is something that is important to me - to say thank you in a personal way - even if it is a personalized 140 character tweet.   I try to treat every donor like their they're special, not matter the size of the gift.  Of course, there are scaling issues.

I spent less time chasing after people who were not in my network who may have a lot of influence and asking them to blog, post on their Facebook profile or retweet.   While an endorsement from a social media rock star can help spread awareness, it's way more important to find the influencers in your network.    Also, as someone who is constantly asked to blog about this campaign, donate to that campaign, please retweet this or that, I know how that feels.

Creating a Culture of Giving in Your Network

This is my 7th personal fundraising campaign.  Not alone, of course, but with lots of help from my friends and network.  This is a passion-driven effort on my part with two goals: to support Cambodian children through the work of the Sharing Foundation and to share my lessons learned with other nonprofits so they can use these tools for the greater social good.

This campaign wasn't about getting the huge donor numbers, velocity, or dollars amounts , it's about building a culture of giving in a personal network or "collective" - and that is about relationship building.  I've learned some interesting ideas about why people are motivated to give.  Some sincerely want to support Cambodian children and others wanted to wish me a happy birthday or express gratitude.  With traditional fundraising, say for example with endowment campaigns, when there are personal solicitations - there is sometimes an undertext of transaction.   "I'll donate to your charity, if you donate to mine."

Working With Free Agent Fundraisers

The Facebook Birthday Causes is designed for an individual, a free agent fundraiser, to fundraise on behalf of a charity, cause, or nonprofit organization that has a Facebook Cause set up.   This means that any one of the half million daily active users of Causes could celebrate their birthday by raising money for your organization's Cause.  

• How will you support and embrace their efforts?

I've already written a fairly detailed post about the positive and negatives of the application features and design.  The biggest flaw I see is that lack of coordination and communication between the individual free agent fundraiser and the organization's Facebook Cause.  I'm not sure exactly how it would work, but a simple message to the Cause administrator that someone has set up a birthday cause would be great.  Or in the reminder tips sent by Cause, tell the birthday fundraiser to contact the Cause administrator.

For example, Amy Sample Ward implemented a birthday campaign for Free Geek, but unless she, as a member of the organization's Cause, tracked down the Cause administrators, there would be no way for the organization to support and build on her efforts. 

I'm also the volunteer administrator for the Sharing Foundation's Cause on Facebook.  I launched the Sharing Foundation Cause last year as an experiment.   We raised $995 and recruited 206 members, but I haven't really done anything with the Cause. 

As my birthday fundraising campaign unfolding, I wondered whether there was some way to incorporate some of the new features in Causes not available in the Birthday Cause.   These features included a donor challenge match and setting a specific fundraising goal with a time period.   If used strategically, these features could provide giving stimulus to a dormant cause.  And, it did.  The Sharing Foundation's Cause ended the campaign with an increase of 30% in members or 349 members and increased the total amount raised by almost 7 times or $6893.

All of the above is most relevant to nonprofits are actively thinking about how to integrate social media into their marketing and fundraising and work with free agent fundraisers.  An event from the last week, makes this all the more compelling for your organization.

The Big Picture

Last week, I blogged about how social media rock star David Armano leveraged his network to raise over $15,000 for a family in need.   He has a large network, is an influencer, and used Twitter and his blog to raise money at the speed of light.  He was performing a human act of kindness for a family in need and in dire circumstances.  I don't know him personally, but I believe he was sincere in intent and donated a small amount to his campaign.

Scott Henderson summarized the initial story as:

Daniela is from Romania and has three kids, the youngest with Down’s Syndrome. According to Armano, “Daniela is divorcing her spouse after years of abuse. In recent years her mortgage went unpaid and she’s lost her house.” Since I have no firsthand knowledge, you’ll need to take it for what it’s worth. Armano and his family have taken Daniela and her family into their home. This week, he decided to leverage his social media network to raise money to get them into their own apartment and on their feet again.

Scott also points to some posts about why the campaign worked from Scott Drummond and David Griner.

The response from his network was nothing less than impressive surpassing the $5,000 goal in two hours and ultimately raising over $16,000 as word of the family's plight traveled around the blogosphere and media and the community that rallied behind David celebrated.

I was sitting in a meeting with some people who work in the nonprofit sector and mentioned the campaign - and there was a less than enthusiatic reaction.  Scott Henderson had a similar reaction explained as "Every dollar raised doesn’t fix the root of the social problems that led to Daniel’s situation.  It all goes to privately benefit one family."

His post (and go read it) created a firestorm of debate as to whether individuals should raise money directly to help other individuals or to support the work of nonprofits who serve the greater social good.   Fascinating conversation, I couldn't help but leave this comment and summarized here:

You've done a beautiful thing to help an individual who is in need right now and who is standing right in front of you. Helping other people in the way that you've done is a passion-driven endeavor and when you see human suffering in front of your eyes, you can't just stand on the sidelines. (Believe me I know. That's what has driven me for the past eight years to raise money from my networks to help individuals in need both in my community and other places in the world)

The collective, social graph, or whatever you want to call it - has opened the doors for new models of giving or a new definition of charity - whether we're donating to nonprofits who are the intermediaries who help people or directly to people in need.

What can those of use who have developed generous and responsive networks and use social media tools do when we want to help an individual in need or make the world a better place? What is the best mechanism to raise money and deliver services?

(1) They can raise money from their networks and directly give to that person or family in need as you have done.

There's nothing new about that .. it's been in churches, immigrant communities, and many other places offline for years. Or, there are loans from family members and friends - that are private transactions. But what happens to those individuals in need who do not have this support network? Where do they turn?

So, now we have this age of connectedness - and the ability to leverage out networks to get something done - and rather quickly - even good deeds. So, you've raised money from your extended online network to help a family in need. Which is a fantastic thing.

You've taken the model one step further in that you are now in the position of providing stewardship of the donated funds (being transparent about how they are being used, spent and reported on) as well as providing social service delivery. In this equation, there isn't a nonprofit intermediary involved to collect and steward the money, oversee the service delivery, and if the event of excess funds raised - apply towards other programs that help more than one individual and indirectly the root causes.

(2) The other approach is by raising money for a nonprofit that can deliver the program or services directly to the person/family in need or help others.

There's been a number of individuals that I've raised money to help (a young woman's college tuition, etc), but I decided to direct donations to a nonprofit that I trusted with the implementation. I also wanted to make sure that people who donated could get a tax receipt. I also didn't want to take on the service delivery aspect as it wasn't my expertise. And, I'm glad I did because I ended up raising more than needed and the excess when to help other students.

Now maybe raising money for a social services nonprofit that could help Daniella wasn't an option in your situation -- maybe there wasn't a social service agency that was nimble enough to steward the donations, set up a fund to assist Daniela, and provide services. Or maybe it wasn't an option that you thought of.

So, now in in addition to fundraising, you've taken on the responsibility of donor steward, creating a community of support, and making sure that Daniella is getting what she needs beyond the money.

I wonder what this says about  the role of nonprofits and charities in an age of social networks?

There's more to the story here.  Scott Henderson posted some further thoughts on the situation based on a conversation with David Armano.  (Please go read it)  

Scott makes some astute observations about how this campaign was different from a traditional fundraising campaign and the new role that David has stepped into.

Furthermore, the Armano family and Daniela will be subject to scrutiny of those who gave and those who know about it. It’s just like if you raised money to help the family next door from everyone in the subdivision. Everyone’s going to be watching, some questioning any new purchase.

Fundraising Sidenote: This drive followed the exact opposite pattern of traditional campaigns. Donations started on the periphery of their social circle and worked inward. Those who gave first were more distant digital neighbors, most of whom were separated by at least two degrees. It was later when their first-degree digital neighbors and geographic neighbors started to join with their support.

Scott ends the post with a few points about his personal charity giving style in age of social networks.

I remain steady in my personal belief that giving to solve the roots of problems through sustainable non-profit organizations is the best use of my time, money, and energy. You’re free to choose otherwise.

Scott makes a point about what it means for nonprofits:

Incumbent non-profit organizations are at risk of becoming irrelevant if they ignore the fundamental shift in how we communicate, connect, and collaborate. Scandals in the wake of 9/11 and Katrina continue to erode confidence in them. Those who choose to embrace the immediacy, intimacy, and velocity of social media to demonstrate the impact they’re making in the world will thrive. The rest will cease to exist.

There are many aspects of this debate and fodder for discussion all around, including Scott's:

• How can you best help people in need?
  
• Is it direct giving on a 1:1 basis or through non-profit organizations?
  
• What do non-profit organizations need to do to stay relevant in the Interconnected Age?

Also thinking about Geoff Livingston's post about the Long Tail of Philanthropy and how the "leveled" playing field not only makes it possible for small organizations to leverage social media for the causes, but for individuals too.

What do you think?

Update:  How is your relationship balance and why it is important to be in the black? by Scott Drummond with links and analysis

Update:  AdvertGirl - Does social Media Really Connect Us?

Update:  Elke Sisco writes about the campaign

A Geek's Reflections on Personal Fundraising Via Blog, Twitter, and Facebook

On September 3, I blogged and tweeted about a story about two interesting social media fundraising opportunities in Africa.  One of them was charity: water, a non-profit bringing safe, clean drinking water to people in developing nations that had launched a September Birthday campaign. (Hat tip Brett Meyer at NTEN) They asked everyone born in September to give up birthday presents and ask their friends and family for donations to build water wells in Ethiopia instead.  More information here.

I tweeted the link one of my twitter followers, Paul Young decided to give personal fundraising with social media a whirl.   According to this post on Mashable, Paul's September 18th birthday fundraiser was a success!  He has raised over $800.

Even better, he shared a detailed analysis of what worked and what didn't.  His key takeaways:

• You’ll have a few super-strong relationships, and these must reside in the real world (your family and best mates) - this is where most of the money came from
• Twitter is a great way to drive people to take action - yes I tweeted many times (up to 20) and I ‘bribed’ followers a little by giving shout outs to those who donated, but $4.50 per click through is great!
• Facebook ‘friends’ are just weak ties - 77 people left me Facebook wall comments saying happy birthday, 34 of them clicked through to my charity page, 1 donated.
• A facebook status is less ‘active’ than a Twitter message - maybe a lot more people are on Facebook, but they’re paying less attention
• The new Facebook design may have confused people - it’s quite possible people missed the link, though 33 of the 34 who did didn’t do anything about it
• A bigger network = bigger results - Pete Cashmore of Mashable fame shares my birthday (and dang, he’s 2 years younger!) and his 12,000 Twitter followers have helped him raise over three times as much money so far (but granted, people aren’t going to throw a thousand bucks at me in order to suck up :))

Paul is hoping to make his goal of $1,000 and still has a week left to do so.  You can donate here.